Comment Interest

I decided to wipe the comments from now on. Nothing personal. It's just that I have an e-mail address (some of you have both) and the only thing I've gotten in the Ramshackle In Box is a few from Mike, a guy from Botswana telling me I've inherited millions and a girl who promises to make my penis bigger. I really appreciate her offer and as soon as the guy sends me my money I'm on the first plane to Cali!

I Aint Got Time To Bleed

I've been told that a new post is needed. I'm game, the problem is that I'm busy. I don't mean like, "Go away kid. We'll play catch later." busy, I mean my damn head hurts busy. I mean I hate looking at my fucking laptop anymore busy. I haven't gone on a date in months busy.

I've never been good at time management, so I'm learning by trial and error and it's been mostly error. I've got a six pager due next week on some topic that I really don't give a shit about and a four pager due this week on a topic that isn't as interesting as I thought it would be. I've kind of dug myself into a hole on the homework. We get some nightly assignments on top of papers and tests. It's a royal pain in my Royal Irish Ass!

I am hereby placing requests for any and all tips on time management in relation to college life. First I'll lay out what I do have:
Day planner with big spaces for each day.
Syllabi for each class laying out the assignments and general class time.
A six year old who does require his daddy time.

The social life seems to have been put on the back burner so if there is room for that too, let me know.

Last time I was this busy was when that bus full of Swedish women broke down in front of my house. They all insisted on staying in my room with me because they were afraid of being left alone. They also forgot their night clothes so they had to sleep naked. I was only being a humanitarian at that point.

Oh yeah, I'm trying out for the Jeopardy! college tournament tonight too. Wish me luck. I'll let you know how that goes as soon as I get my results.

And your King and Queen are...

I've decided to bring my old composition book out of retirement and take notes during the day. This way when I can get on my computer and bring you a post I can remember what it was that caught me as funny that day. There is no shortage of entertainment these days either.

The biggest thing on my mind right now is the Homecoming Dilemma. I recently learned that my school has a Homecoming dance. Yes, it is just like the high school version complete with a court and a planning committee. This of course brought out jokes of Dad driving my date and me, "be careful when pinning on the corsage", is someone having a party afterwards, are you two going to do it, etc. If you can think of all the drama and cliches associated with Homecoming you can guess the jokes I made.

Over the past few days I've gotten to know some of my classmates and I have heard conversation of the dance. I was asked if I was going. I stared blankly and said, "I don't know." "Well, you should go." they said "It'll be a good time." Honestly, part of me really wants to go. It's a chance to get dolled up and out of the house.

Now, here's the moral dilemma: Most of the girls I've met and interact with cannot buy their own beer yet. They're legal, but just barely (see what I did there?). I really don't want to go there. But, at the same time, that's who I see daily. Wonder if they have older sisters?

I have met two who are in my own age group, however. One works at the school (good looking, laughs at my jokes). The other one cuts my hair (also good looking, very sarcastic sense of humor). I have had pretty decent and flirty conversations with both and they are both intelligent and I wouldn't mind being seen in public with them.

So there we have it. Homecoming, looks, age, and the fear of Chris Hansen. What do you all think?

Week 1 Done

Coming to you live from the library I am officially a college student, not because I'm taking classes, but because I'm blowing off work on those classes to do something completely unrelated. All kidding aside, I am very happy to be here. It's been a long road to get to this campus. I plan to get all I can out of these folks because, dammit I'm paying them enough!

So far my classes have been worthwhile. A lot of reading! I've not read for retention in 1o years, I've only read for pleasure. That really isn't that big of a deal though, I'm quickly getting the hang of it. The age difference isn't too bad either, but you can tell that it's there. One of the kids in my history class is in the ROTC who is already committed to the Army and he sounds just like I did before I went to boot camp. The headstrong, naive, bullet proof feeling of them fascinates me. I know I'm not old by any means, but it's interesting to listen to their take on the world around them and what they think and want their lives should be like.

The school's radio station put out a call for DJ's and I've decided that I am going to go for it. I think it would be a riot to have my own show. I just hope everyone else will appreciate it. I'm thinking that it would be fun to have someone else with me in the studio because I tend to be a lot more humorous when I can play off the energy of someone else. We'll see how it goes...

They Took The Pool?

Not to fear, new posts are coming soon and I have a feeling that I will have plenty of material with the coming school year. The biggest one being that I'm 10 years older than most of my classmates. Amazing how fast that decade has gone. I still feel like I just graduated this past May.

I'm surrounded by boxes and I still need to fill some more, so I'll see you in Ohio.

Meeting With The Bobs

I gave my notice (finally). Much to my surprise, there were no shouting matches or long winded statements of how I was making the worst decision of my life. As I've said before, I don't know why I was expecting that. Oh well. I simply went in to the manager's office, handed him my letter and said, "This is my notice. I've had several pieces fall in to place and it's an opportunity that I just can't pass up." He complimented me on my decision saying that I was bettering myself and no one could look down on me for that. We had a nice conversation for about 45 minutes; I don't think I've talked to him that long since my interview.

One mountain climbed, the Himalayas to go.

Welcome back! I quit.

This is the big week when I tell my company that I will no longer be working for them. There are two things that make this weird for me, 1) the last job I quit was in high school. I just walked in and said, "I'm joining the military, so I'm going to enjoy my last month of freedom. See ya!" and 2) the last job I held I couldn't quit without going to jail or something else unpleasant. Because of that little problem I found myself not really knowing how to go about this; I consulted the internets. I found a jubilee of resignation letter templates that will do so apparently quitting is not as hard as I would have imagined.

Like usual I found the best advice came from our friend, Mike. I've decided to go the route he did and treat my quitting like a break up with less yelling and hopefully they don't throw my stuff on the front lawn because I still have to pay the sugar daddies over in the apartment complex office. However, just like breaking up, I'm finding that there is really no good time.

My boss was on vacation last week and on his way home he ran into some problems which prevented him from coming to work on Monday, one day gone. Then he got home to find someone had pulled a hit and run on his car so he spent Tuesday with that mess, two days gone. Today he's sick or something, three days gone. I hate to dump this on him too so soon after such a bad week, but I'm running out of time to give them proper notice.

Either way, I'll probably wait until Friday because, "We find it's always better to fire people on a Friday. Studies have statistically shown that there's less chance of an incident if you do it at the end of the week." (+10 if you know the movie)

Tuck and Shave

Of all the postings here it dawned on me that I've never told any humorous military stories, so to fix that I'll share my favorite of all time.


As anyone who has been through boot camp will tell you that we did a lot of stupid things daily that made no sense. One such practice was tucking our shirts into everything. If you're wearing uniform pants, tuck your shirt in. If you're wearing exercise (PT) shorts, tuck your shirt in. If you're wearing a sweat suit, tuck your sweatshirt in. The point: We always had to have our damn shirts tucked in.

The military also has written directives on how to do almost everything. One such directive is the "Marine Corps Grooming Standard" that dictates our hair cut, our weight, our glasses, and how wear our clothes. There is a line that specifically states "The face will be clean-shaven, except that a mustache may be worn." It's that first part that got me in trouble. We didn't learn verbatim the shaving part, but we did shave everyday so maybe they figured we'd keep up the practice or maybe I was just sick that day.

I have the curse of having a 5 O'clock shadow by noon, because of this, shaving everyday for me is not only a pain in the ass figuratively it's a pain on my face literally. I countered this by not shaving all weekend or on days off so I could give myself a break. This was all well and good if I would have had my own place to live outside the gates, but when you live on base there are countless number of people who are waiting to not only point out your problem but also tell you loudly, it makes for some drama. One such incident occurred when I went shopping with the wife.

It was a typical Saturday morning, I was sitting on the sofa in my boxers drinking coffee watching TV when the wife then says, "I want to go to the mall." So I head to the mall without shaving. It didn't cross my mind until who should come walking the other way but the Sergeant Major who is a career grunt who is going through culture shock by serving in his first Intelligence Battalion in over 20 years. We didn't get along. He worked harder and I worked smarter. The two worlds could not be further opposite.

Upon seeing him I quickly did what any man would do in that situation, I hid in the nearest store in hopes that he wouldn't see me or my "Elvis Beard"(I know Elvis never wore a beard, but to many a Sergeant Major he did and, he was also used to illustrate all contradictions to the grooming standard.). After he passed I went back to my wife who was standing in the center of the mall with a very confused and annoyed look on her face. I thought I was safe; but come Monday it was apparent that I thought wrong.

As I passed his office I hear "Lance Corporal!" I tried the dumb approach and entered his office with a smile (Mistake 1) and said, "Good morning Sergeant Major! What can I do for you?" (Mistake 2) He told me that entrance was disrespectful and he'd address that shortly but first, "Didn't they teach you in boot camp to shave every day? Didn't you're highly motivated, truly dedicated Drill Instructors tell you that a Marine is to be clean shaven daily?" To which my prep school smugness kicked in and I responded with a very dry, "Yes Sergeant Major my DI's did have me shave everyday, but then again, they also had us tuck our t-shirts into our underwear so I just figured it was another cruel joke." As I watched his eyes bulge, his face turn red, his teeth began to grind, and I notice the vein on his forehead begin to swell I knew I was in for a real treat. He proceeded to verbally assault everything about me except my mother.

I expected this reaction, so the yelling didn't really bother me. What I took away from the whole thing, however, was this: The Sergeant Major was not a witty man. If he was he would have told me to pull my pants down to make sure my T-shirt was tucked into my underwear and then yelled at me for that too.

Make 'em an Offer He Can't Refuse

The contract that I work on is up for renewal this year. Because of this many companies, including mine, are submitting bids to the government. A few weeks back Bossman brought in "commitment letters" for us to sign. At first we were a little worried about signing them but after reading them our fears were subsided. The letter simply stated that we would not give our resume to a competing bidder. I could go to another company if I so wished, but I couldn't have that company submit my resume as part of their package for my current job. Clear as mud? Good, let's move on!

I had no problem saying that I wouldn't give my resume to someone else because I honestly had no intention of doing that. Mostly because I know I'll be gone by the end of August anyway, but even if I wasn't I'm fairly content in my current position. I signed the letter and returned it to Bossman with a fake smile.

We had a meeting a few days later where Bosslady (who is higher up the chain) addressed the issue of the commitment letters. Her stance was, "If you're not committed to Company than Company is not committed to you and your resume will not be submitted as part of our package." I don't know what she meant, but I took it as a notice to look for another job if you don't sign these things.

Now we come to yesterday. I arrive to work and before I even sit down I'm told that the commitment letter has to be signed again because there was a rewording. Fine. Bossman brings new letters and they say the same thing except for this little paragraph at the bottom that states, "Upon reward I will be available for immediate start and will remain with the contract for a minimum of six months..." I looked at Bossman and said, "I can't promise you six months. It's nothing personal, but there is no way I can guarantee that." The others looked at me with shock. Eyebrows raised. Mouths dropped open. Car tires screeched in the background. If there was music it would have played "Dun Dun Daaaaaa". I basically gave my notice three weeks earlier than I wanted to.

Now, you're probably thinking, "You're leaving anyway, no big deal that you didn't sign!" And your are correct, however, even if I wasn't leaving I'd have a hard time with these letters. I get emails daily about positions that are opening from other companies as well as my own. If I had signed this and got an offer paying me more money closer to home I would be unable to pursue that job. As a financially strapped single parent my eyes where always open to better opportunities. Since I've decided on going back to school my interest has weened, but prior to that I gave every opening a thorough look. I would be unable to do that if I signed.

Over all I'm not worried about it because my path is set already. I feel bad for those that signed it and will get screwed over by it. I feel even worse for those that drank the Kool-Aide and signed it blindly. After two contracts with the military I am wary of any employment contracts. I'm also new to the civilian world so I'm not sure if this is something I can expect, but it doesn't seem to be common practice. Only time will tell. As for now, I wonder if the next six weeks will bring about any blow back from above.

What's That Smell?

After I picked up Quentin I was at a light preparing for the Beltway Battle. I had my windows down to enjoy the low humidity when a strange yet familiar smell entered the truck. I looked to my immediate right at the young woman yammering on her cell phone thinking maybe it was her, but she had the windows up. I looked behind me to see Quentin and an empty lane. I then look a lane over to see a gentleman take a drag off a hand rolled cigarette, hold in the smoke, and then release some more of that sweet scent I had just noticed.

I've seen people smoke weed before, but never so brazenly. This guy was in traffic, during rush hour, puffing away without a care in the world. The best part of this whole exchange was that two blocks behind us were about three cops arresting arresting a couple of guys. Maybe he bought the weed from them.

George Carlin

Another week begins and another death of a prominent figure greets us there. George Carlin was absolutely one of my favorite comedians ever. His ability to put together a routine on the most mundane of life experiences is something that I always enjoyed, looked forward too, and I will miss greatly.

Quentin will forever know him as the narrator for his Thomas & Friends movies and the voice of Fillmore in Cars.

He is most famous for the Seven Dirty Words but my favorite is the difference between football and baseball.




I cannot walk into an airport without thinking of this:
Part One


Part 2

My Thoughts On Tim Russert

You all know what happened so there is no need to reiterate the details. There were also a copious amount of tribute shows this weekend telling you what a great man he was so I'm not going to repeat that either. I'll just say that I didn't watch Meet the Press every week although I should have. I always enjoyed how brilliant he was in hiding his own agenda. He was "tough but fair" to folks from both sides of the aisle. When he took over the show he called the show's creator and asked what his vision was when they started and he told Tim to, "learn as much as you can about the guest's views and opinions; then take the opposite side." In doing this he was quite possibly the best interviewer I have ever watched.

If you've never had the pleasure of seeing any of his interviews I would urge all of you to go to Youtube and watch some of the videos. Don't pay the comment section too much attention. Those guys are assholes of the highest degree.

If you would like to read more, you can start with the Wikipedia entry. There are several links and references on that page to other sites. He was an interesting man who worked in politics, journalism, and even showed up to Woodstock "wearing a Bills jersey and carrying a case of beer."

Russert questioning Stephen Colbert as to why it's pronounced Bert and not Ber.

Oh Happy Day!

Today started off as a normal day; Quentin moving at his own speed, me fumbling around trying to figure out what to do next, and the TV telling me how hot it's going to be and how much traffic to expect. In preparation for today's heat I donned my white polo shirt and packed shorts to change into for the Battle of the Beltway drive home.

We got out the door at a pretty good time and I dropped Quentin off at daycare, that's when it happened. For the second week in a row, I dribbled coffee on my white shirt. This is something that I live in constant fear of every morning. Last week it didn't happen until I was turning into the work parking lot, no going home to change there. Today I was relatively close to home so a dilemma faced me: go change shirts or try to tough it out at work. I chose the former. I darted home while loudly cursing every traffic light that decided it would turn red as I approached it. I finally got in the house, took off the shirt, ran it under water, changed into another darker polo, and made it to work only 15 minutes late.

I left my cell phone in the truck so I went back outside to get it when I looked down and noticed a fresh brown spot on my shirt. I have a great week ahead of me.

It's In The Papers!

I am now officially a published photographer. There was a photo contest in a local newspaper and I was chosen as the winner. You can see the online version here. It also comes with my first negative review! What a day!

I figured that I'd get some sort of bashing at some point in my photography life, but this guy just pissed me off. As you all should know by now, I can't let things go, so I responded by politely telling him to go fornicate with himself. Actually it didn't really piss me off too much, I chuckled when I read it, but either way, I can't let it go without defending myself. I just hope in doing so I didn't look like some snooty artist wanna-be.

Overheard in the Hall

Two co-workers walked by my door and I heard the lady ask the man: "Have you ever been in a heterosexual relationship?" I didn't get to hear the answer, but who cares? It provided me with a small post. The best part is the guy she said that to is someone who's sexuality we've been wondering about lately.

I know I need to post more, but nothing is catching my attention as particularly entertaining plus I'm fighting off the annual summer cold. I hate being sick and I hate being sick in the summer even more.

Men's Room Follies

Just when I thought I didn't have any material left for the month a douche bag co-worker swooped in and saved the day.

I was in the mens room alone. I finished, zipped, flushed, and heard the door. As I stepped over to wash I hear, "You don't always have to use the short one, man." I replied, "I'm short. I do. Shut up." He replied with an awkward chuckle. For those of you that don't know, I'm 5'5" and I'm perfectly happy with my height (mostly because I know it's something that I can't change). Secondly, I use the one proportional to my height and therefore avoid unwanted mess. And, finally, the shut up was a preemptive strike against the obligatory dick joke that would surly follow as well as letting him know that I didn't wish to discuss this.

The biggest thing that bothers me about this is not my toilet selection, but the fact that I hate being spoken to while I'm in the men's room. There are two things you don't do, when the boss asks if there are any questions at the end of a meeting you don't ask and you never talk in the men's room.

To top it all off this is the same co-worker that came in yesterday and started asking me about building web sites, like I care at 3:30. He wanted to know how to build a MySpace or Facebook type thing. I told him that it wouldn't work because that market has already passed, no one is going to leave the Space, the Book, or that other one for some start up page. After many attempts to show him I didn't care ("How do you build websites?" "I don't know, I don't care. I go home and sit in front of the TV.") he still rambled on about how much money he thinks would be in it. I stopped listening and went back to looking at the Space. He got the point and left shortly after.

Two days in a row this guy screwed up my otherwise pleasant work week.

When we have a meeting again I'm waiting for this assbag to ask the boss if we can all meet in the mens room for further discussion.

May I Take Your Order?

I'm so sick of the fast food industry! I still love me some fast food, but I'm sick of the combo meals and the gallons of soda that come with them. When the combo meals were first introduced it was a wonderful idea. I could get the items I usually ordered together in a fairly priced package by saying a number, grabbing my order, and going on my way. It had normal size fries and normal sized drinks and if I wanted more I could request a Super Size! Soon after the sodas started taking over and they have been growing ever since.

Taco Bell started first, you order the five soft taco combo and the employee would hand you forty ounces of Pepsi. (What am I going to do with this? It's not like I can put it in the fridge for later. This damn thing barely fits in the cup holder.) The other chains followed suit and next thing I know my lunch time ended up like a night at the movies. "Would you like a popcorn the size of Rhode Island for only a quarter more?" "Sure, why not?" Smalls became mediums, mediums became larges, and larges became toddlers. No longer could I have passengers in the truck because the soda was strapped in the safety seat next to me.

From now on I guess I'm stuck ordering small combo meals. The problem with small combo meals is that the drink is what a medium used to be, but the small fries are still small if not smaller.

It's a cruel world.

Fun With the Camera Phone.

I have one coworker who has so much crap that one person can barely fit into the cubicle which is about 7' x 7'. I am a little messy when it comes to desks but no where near this. My idea of a mess is some random papers in a pile or maybe yesterdays unwashed coffee mug. What's even better is that this co-worker drives a little Prius and that is also loaded up with so much crap that only the driver seat is available. I climbed on the desk of the cube next door to give you the full view:



I also work with a lot of bad fashion. It's hard to pick the worst, but I definitely found the brightest:

To be fair, my son has a bright green polo just like this, but I make sure he wears it with darker pants to dim it down. This guy's color combo is like sun on snow when he's under the florescent lights of the office.

I guess Obama isn't the only elitist this year.

Public Service Announcement

I want you to go read this posting from Skippy and then come back. I'll be right here waiting for you like Richard Marx. GO! NOW!

I want to echo everything Skippy says. If I have any readers out there who are going through stuff and you don't have anyone to open up to, by all means, open up here. I've seen way too much of this stuff get pushed aside by military members not wanting to appear soft or weak or what ever. It's like Ramshackle Sr. said to me, "A real man isn't afraid to ask for help when he needs it."

I knew a lot of folks when I was on active duty that didn't have family around them like I do, so it can be tough and you may think you're alone, but there are a lot of people out there who want to help; all you have to do is ask.

Debate Your Side

While I was in the military I had tunnel vision of my beliefs. I was surrounded by a very conservative group and that greatly affected how I viewed the world. We were also restricted from truly speaking our minds, if you agreed with the leadership you could speak up but if you disagreed you had to walk a very fine line in voicing your opinion. Since I'm now free to decide and say what I want I'm taking second looks my beliefs are and how I truly stand. I've also purposely involved myself in political discussions and debates via on-line message boards, I would encourage everyone to do this because you can say you feel strongly about an issue all day long, but when you are forced to defend it you find out if it's real or not. A word of caution: the on-line community is harsh and if you are easily offended, this may not be your best outlet.

In the last election people heavily criticized John Kerry for being a "flip-flopper" and I'm guilty of it too, but the more I thought about it the more I came to see that as a good thing. You have to be careful to not just go with what's popular, but if you take time to do research and find as many facts as you can and then change your opinion on something, I have no problem with that. I was a big supporter of the current administration and I am not ashamed to say that I voted for it twice because that was who I believed represented me at the time. Now that I've done some research and read countless reports and just watched what they've done along the way I am no longer a supporter. With this coming election, John McCain doesn't represent what I believe in, Obama does. End of story. If the next election rolls around and the Republican is the one that I like, well then that's who I'll support.

The point again, folks, is think on your own, do research, listen to all sides, gather facts, and don't blindly follow party lines. The left can be just as dangerous as the right.